


not yet gone

by pawn_vs_player



Category: Original Work
Genre: Afterlife, Angst and Feels, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Guardian Angels, Original Character Death(s), Other, Sad with a Happy Ending, Sibling Love, Wakes & Funerals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-21
Updated: 2017-01-21
Packaged: 2018-09-18 21:45:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9404375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pawn_vs_player/pseuds/pawn_vs_player
Summary: You die on a Saturday, but you're far from done.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written before I was on antidepressants. It probably shows.

You die on a Saturday night. You wake up three seconds later, still shivering and confused. All you see is light, light and light and light, stretching on forever. Vague shapes imprint on your eyes, pillars and halls and walkways, and all of it is made of light. Your head should hurt, but for once it doesn’t.

One of the light-shapes moves, gliding toward you. What you thought was an inanimate pillar is more humanoid, impossibly tall and soft lavender, without solid legs or a face. The head slims down into a wispy tail the farther up it goes, like a column of smoke, and the eyes are simple dots of bright gold in the “face”. It reaches out a hand for you, fingers strange and slender. For a long moment, you can’t make your fingers work, and you look down at yourself to figure out why.

You’re made of light too, somewhere between orange and gold, pale and somehow washed-out. You blink, and you realize you’re not breathing. Your fingers move, then, pencil-thin spikes of light that intertwine with the lavender fingers of the lightbeing. You look back up at them as they pull you gently to your feet-  _ at least I have feet, _ you think. You think you should probably be more freaked-out about this than you are, but you’re drifting in a strange sort of calm that you can’t find it in yourself to break.

| _ Where are we? _ | you ask the lightbeing. You get the impression of a smile directed at you, even though there is no mouth.

| _ Wherever you wish to be, _ | it answers. The smile fades. | _ But you may not be able to stay for long. _ |

You blink. | _ Why? _ |

| _ You have a choice to make. _ | The lightbeing’s eyes are hard as gold nuggets. | _ You may choose to stay here. Or you could become something other. _ |

| _ Why would I choose to change?| _ you ask.

| _ You left people behind. Important people. _ | And there’s a spark of recognition then, brown eyes and dark hair and intertwined hands, a name or few. You bite your lip before realizing you have one. | _ Should you choose to, you could protect them until they arrive here.| _

| _ Would they know?| _ you ask, the calm starting to waver. | _ Would they know I was there, taking care of them? _ |

The lightbeing hesitates. | _ Perhaps. _ |

You close your eyes, bask in the peace and glow. You know what you need to do.

| _ Send me back, _ | you tell it, and the lightbeing lets go of your hand to touch your forehead. 

You blink, and you’re standing outside your house, and people are walking through you. You look down at yourself: you look just like you did just before you died, wrapped in your black winter jacket and feet shoved into your sneakers, paint dried on your jeans and short hair ruffled. You know you’re dead, but it doesn’t bother you as much as you thought it would. You shove your hands into your pockets and look up at your house, at your second-floor window. You wonder how much time has passed; how long they’ve been without you. You wonder how badly you’ve broken everyone.

You glance down the street. There’s a cop car parking, and as you watch, two policewomen step out of the car. One glances at a piece of paper in her hand, then at your house.

_ They’re the newsbreakers, _ you realize, stomach flipping, and you realize that you can’t watch this.

You shut your eyes and bite your lip, and you’re sitting on a stone wall on the other side of the country, and you open your eyes to see your younger cousin on the swings. You’re at a playground. His eyes are closed, head thrown back, grinning wildly. He’s alone. You smile at him and his joy and cross your legs, put your hands on your thighs, watch him swing higher and higher. You remember being that age and trying to touch the sky, insisting that you could. You wonder if you have, if you were in the sky, if that’s what it looks like to a dead person. You wonder where you went, other than the obvious.

You don’t know how long you sit there before he glances at his grasshopper watch and gasps, jumping off the swing and dashing along the street. You follow him to his house, until his father opens the door and grins at him and ushers him inside. You know you need to face the music, do what you’re here for.

You close your eyes and think of home.

You open them on your sister’s bed. She’s sitting on your bed, eyes blank and face cold, staring at the wall. You flinch, unable to move for a minute.

She sniffs, doesn’t move except to breathe and blink every once in a while. You gather your courage and slip up onto the bed next to her, wrapping your arm around her shoulder like you did when you were alive.

She sucks in a harsh breath, blinking rapidly. You’re not ready for her to cry, but she has to, so you kiss her temple and murmur,  _ It’s okay. Cry. It’ll make you feel better. _

She sobs. You stay wrapped around her, murmuring apologies into her hair. 

You visit your mother next. She’s laying down on her side, staring at the phone. She knows the relatives need to be told, but she’s barely okay enough to breathe and entertain the idea, let alone move enough to dial the numbers. You curl up behind her, toss an arm over her waist, and tell her to breathe.

Once she’s saying, “Dad?” into the receiver, shaky and tear-choked but audible, you slip out of the bed and down the stairs. You need to see your dad.

He’s sitting at his desk, staring unseeing at his computer screen. It’s open to an online game, and you freeze for a moment:  _ I never got to finish my level. _ But you swallow, put a hand on his shoulder, lean down and curl your arms around his neck.

_ It’s okay, Daddy, _ you whisper, leaning your chin on his head.  _ I’m still here. _

He drops his face into his hands. You’ve never seen your dad cry before.

You swallow, kiss his head, and stay. It’s all you can really do.

You go to  _ her _ last. You feel guilty about that, but the truth is, your sister and your parents have loved you for far longer than she has, and your sister’s the one you thought of back then. She’s sitting on her bed, and she’s smiling. You’re confused for a second before you realize:  _ She hasn’t been told yet. _

You bite your lip, staring at her. You don’t want to hurt her, you never have. You crawl onto the bed beside her, a little weirded out by the fact that the bed doesn’t react to you sitting on it, and shimmy behind her, tucking your arms around her and hooking your chin on her shoulder. She’s on her computer, reading a story; you smile and read alongside her, waiting for the news to hit.

It does. She sobs. You hold her and kiss her face and promise that you won’t leave her, and you mean it.

 

You stay. You can’t leave, not until everyone else does, but it’s hardly a burden. You chose this.

You follow them through the five stages of grief. You attend the first of your grandparents’ funerals and feel empty. You follow your sister and  _ her _ through high school and college, watch your sister go into art and her into chemistry. You praise your sister’s art and are confused by what  _ she _ does, but you’re still proud. 

You watch your sister go on one date, then another. You threaten him even though he can’t sense you, poking his chest and growling and glaring, and you sit by her bed and listen to her talk to her mirror about him. You think he’ll do her good.

You watch  _ her _ meet someone new and start talking, start meeting up on not-dates, start kissing. You grin and kiss her forehead and tell her you don’t mind, which is true. You tell her to go for it, to enjoy herself, to not let you hold her back. 

She doesn’t. You’re happy for her.

 

Your father dies first, which isn’t a surprise. Your grandparents, all six, are gone; it’s your mother and her sister’s family and your sister, and the extended family you used to see once or twice a year. You sit atop the lower part of the coffin and stare at his face until the lid is closed; then you move to your mother, wrap an arm around her shoulder and hold her while she cries, slip your hand into your sister’s and squeeze. Her fingers spasm, like for just a second she felt it, and she cries quietly as your mother sobs.

You close your eyes and wish you could cry too.

 

Your mother dies three years later, and your sister stands alone at the ceremony despite all the relatives. You keep your eyes on your mother’s waxy face but you stay by your sister’s side, hold her hand and press kisses against her hair. She is in her forties now, unmarried and childless with a string of ended relationships, and you wonder why, when it was always you who was supposed to be alone.

 

You stopped watching  _ her _ twenty years ago, after she got married and had her daughter. She didn’t need you anymore.

 

Your sister dies on a Sunday night, in her sleep, at eighty-three. You’re there when her soul sits up out of her body and looks at you with her beautiful green-hazel eyes and asks,  _ Are you real? _

_ Take my hand, _ you tell her, and she does.

 

You open your eyes in the place of light and peace, your sister’s fingers warm in yours, and you smile.


End file.
